Letter Y April A to Z Challenge #AtoZChallenge

Day 25 April A to Z Challenge my theme is characters from books I’ve read plus some audience participation.

Letter Y is for Yvette from The Mystery Box by Eva Pohler.

I really didn’t know what to expect from this book. It’s a mystery thriller with many different emotions running through it. Yvette and her family live in Texas. They share a fence with a cranky women they’ve nicknamed Cruella she moans when their dog barks and the kids are too noisy. One day a mystery package arrives and Yvette discovers it belongs to Cruella.

Cruella’s real name is Mona and when Yvette deliveries the package she finds a strange lonely woman who has a tale to tell. Mona invites Yvette to her house and begins a spine chilling story. Yvette becomes hooked by the tale and Mona drip feeds her instalments each day. However all Yvette’s instincts are on high alert, something’s not right.

A second story evolves, Yvette’s life is mundane and she’s becoming estranged from her husband. Memories of her childhood and relations with her mother surface as the book continues. Yvette is appalled by Mona’s tale but each day she’s left on a cliff edge and like a drug she wants to hear more. But who is Mona? She tells Yvette about the Taliban spy’s lover and her relationship with Professor Ahmed Jaffar.

Yvette believes Mona may have suffered from the Stockholm syndrome. Feelings of affection of a kid-napping victim for their captor. With the family away camping Mona’s tale comes to a shocking end. One which makes Yvette flee, but running won’t keep Yvette and her family safe.

I was never sure if Mona could be trusted or not, and like Yvette my instincts saw red. This was a very clever tale which turned eerily sinister.

Some fantastic book titles for the letter X yesterday. The school of X-rays, School Xing, Xerus Inaures Goes to school, XXVth school reunions and all their horrors, Xavier goes to school, X was his name, Xylose and its uses, X’s & O’s: The school of Tic-Tac-Toe, Xeroes and the mystery final exam, X lessons.

Love the sound of The Mystery Box Rosie, definitely adding that to my list 🙂

Young Buds Bloom – a sickly sweet romance starring Paeony Pink (I feel I should know what this flower is…but don’t so I’ve made it up!) as a young shy gawky and totally ignored by everyone teen suddenly becoming ‘popular’ when she blossoms into a ravishing beauty that sets all the boys hearts aflutter…sorry have had to stop myself from adding something caustic to the end of that – haha!

I love the cover of The Mystery Box!
Mystery/thriller is my favorite genre 😀

Book Title – Year Of Floral Grace.
A hardback, coffee-table edition.
An inspirational guide filled with 365 daily meditations, stimulating quotations, and thought-provoking snippets. Each meditation is accompanied by a high resolution photo of, and linked directly to, a relevant flower.
(I’m wondering if there are 365 types of flowers in existence to cater for such a book? Probably…) 🙂

Love the sound of the ambiguity in The Mystery Box.
Today’s title: Yield to the Hollyhock – while planting out rows of hollyhocks, keen gardener, Yvonne, feels a tad peculiar. The hollyhocks have a message for her. Will she listen?